


seeking heaven

by starboykeith



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Guardian Angels, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Alternate Universe - Supernatural (TV) Fusion, Developing Relationship, First Meetings, Guardian Angels, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, M/M, Minor Violence, Protective Shiro (Voltron), Sexual Tension, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-22
Updated: 2019-01-25
Packaged: 2019-09-23 01:45:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,918
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17071115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starboykeith/pseuds/starboykeith
Summary: Keith gets a guardian angel. He’s not very happy about it.However, when forces beyond their control begin to mobilise, Shiro realises his very first assignment is about to get a hell of a lot harder. No pun intended.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> psa: not intended as a supernatural au. it’s listed as spn fusion because of the lore i’m borrowing, but i’m doing my own thing with it
> 
> title from be my daddy by lana del rey (yes seriously)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this was supposed to be short but i got super invested

Shiro shouldn’t feel nervous. He should feel calm, _righteous_ – it’s an honour to be assigned as a guardian, and it is said that nothing is more gratifying than the awe and respect afforded to angels by their charges.

He’s been here a while. Keith Kogane has been sharpening his knives since before the sun went down, letting the room go dark around him, lit only by the dim motel sign and the occasional flash of lightning. Shiro can’t seem to find an appropriate moment to materialise, feeling awkward and out of place as he always had in Heaven and hoped he would not be on Earth. He studies the man instead.

Keith seems fairly tall, despite his sitting position. He has long black hair, currently twisted and stuffed into a messy knot at the nape of his neck, but loose strands fall freely about his face. It’s irritating to look at; Shiro wants to reach over and tuck the hair behind Keith’s ears.

He wears simple clothes – dark jeans, plaid shirt. There’s a leather jacket tossed carelessly over the desk chair, along with a nondescript duffel bag, but Keith is sitting on the floor, legs crossed like a child.

Shiro knows him to be twenty-six years of age, but Keith’s various scars and the deep shadows under his eyes make him older.

But his soul is bright, and Shiro has been drawn to it since the first moment he learned of Keith, drawn to the pulse of light and warmth and goodness, despite all the man has been through. His words tingle, and Shiro thinks of them, a messy scrawl that had materialised on his vessel’s wrist. He is not the first angel with a human soulmate, and will not be the last, but the lonely experience of waiting millennia for the being whose soul complements his own Grace has already been forgotten in favour of regarding Keith, the greatest gift he will ever receive. Despite his nerves.

Shiro sighs. He thinks the expression is ‘biting the bullet’.

“Hello, Keith.”

“ _Fucking_ hell!”

In the time it takes Shiro to consider if he ought to be offended at the implications of such a statement, Keith is across the room and plunging a knife into his chest.

Shiro’s guilt is instantaneous; his vessel probably would have liked these clothes back.

He’s never really heard of charges _stabbing_ their angels before, and takes a moment to reflect as he gazes at the anger in Keith’s eyes. Slowly and deliberately, Shiro removes the knife from his chest, mouth a thin line, and lets it clatter to the floor.

Keith looks – Keith looks _terrified_.

“Who are you?” he demands.

“Shiro.” Keith’s eyes narrow. “Your soulmate.”

Keith’s eyes drop to where Shiro knows his soul words must be, hidden by his long-sleeved shirt. Shiro reserves the sight of them for another time but Keith folds his arms regardless, self-conscious.

“Sure thing, Shiro – I mean _what_ are you?” His tone is hostile. Shiro doesn’t know what to do; wasn’t trained for this moment. He was instructed to descend, introduce himself, and – _help_ , however he could.

“I’m an Angel of the Lord.”

“Get the hell outta here,” Keith says. Shiro registers some long-forgotten accent in the words. “There’s no such thing.”

Heaven ought to amend their training program.

There’s a gun in Keith’s hands now. Shiro reconsiders his previous understanding of the idiom ‘biting the bullet’. “Who sent you?” Keith demands.

“God commanded it,” Shiro says, a note of pride in his tone. Keith’s heart is beating alarmingly fast, but his hands are steady on the gun. He radiates disbelief, and Shiro’s thoughts slide toward the negative. It’s his own fault, he realises, for choosing to appear like this – amidst thunder and lightning, true, but sans the pomp and circumstance preferred by career guardians. Perhaps humans do require a show of authority to know who they’re talking to.

“You have no faith,” he says, but it sounds like a question.

Keith snorts. “No shit.”

Shiro takes a breath his vessel does not need. Next time lightning flashes, the shadows of his wings – enormous on a human body, spanning nearly the length of the room – project on the wall, and Keith stumbles away from him, useless gun lowering to his side.

“My fucking soulmate,” Keith mutters. Shiro wonders if he is always so crude.

“I have tried to contact you,” he says. In another realm, he flexes his wings; in this realm, he wills them to disappear, and when lightning strikes again, Keith’s sidelong glance at the wall sees nothing.

“It was you,” Keith realises. “Blew out all the windows at the gas station?”

Not his finest moment. “Yes.”

“That was you _talking_?”

Shiro inclines his head. “My mistake.”

“Yeah.” Keith shakes his head. “Look, I’m not buying it. So who are you, really, and who sent you? Because I swear to – “ He cuts himself off, lip curling.

“I told you,” Shiro says. He tones it down – his voice, his expression, his posture. This vessel towers over Keith, which may have been a mistake. His earnestness, however, is genuine; if only Keith would just _understand_. “I am Shiro, an Angel of the Lord, and my holy purpose – “

“So, what, you’re my guardian angel?”

It seems apt enough, Shiro thinks. “Yes,” he says. The human interpretation of a guardian angel differs slightly from Heaven's: where humans think of a hidden helping hand, angels must introduce themselves and state their purpose. Guardians are only assigned where circumstances demand it; Shiro has yet to discover the source of Keith's difficulty.

Keith scoffs. “Why?”

“Good things do happen, Keith.” Shiro tilts his head to the side, examining the human. Keith had relaxed as Shiro did, subconsciously or not, but he still holds the gun in a vice-like grip, like the fragile metal can provide him protection. Shiro supposes it can, but not against power like himself.

“Not in my experience.” Keith’s shoulders go slack, like he’s given up. “Look, whoever sent you – the Griffins, whoever. If my best knife can’t kill you,” he stoops to retrieve it, and Shiro catches only a glimpse of the sigils carved into the blade, “maybe I deserve to die.”

“Don’t say things like that,” Shiro says immediately, and in his panic infuses it with more authority than he’d meant to. He has not waited all this time for his soulmate to slip between his fingers. Keith rubs the back of his neck uncomfortably, eyes wide. “I am here to safeguard; to help. That is my directive.”

“Your directive, huh? Then you won’t mind if I test you a little bit.”

“Of course not,” Shiro says, privately amused. No heavenly creature would lie to the Creation, but Keith’s soul is wary, puffing itself up in the face of its perceived adversary. Shiro would like to cradle it in his hands, shelter its warmth between his wings and soothe Keith’s battered, beautiful soul as only guardians can, but he can see Keith won’t let him in. Not yet. Keith is barred to him, something dark crawling around his goodness and blocking Shiro’s reach.

It isn’t uncommon for charges to be wary, but all Shiro has heard of have had faith to ease the way. Keith, who would have killed Shiro upon first sight if he’d known how, has none.

The black smudge of Keith’s disbelief lessens with each trial he puts Shiro through; he removes a variety of ingredients and herbs from the duffel and proceeds to daub sticky material on the vessel’s skin; to draw, with both paint and blood, sigils on the floor and walls, and finally to flick holy water at Shiro, who finds it slightly degrading but puts up with it for his soulmate’s sake.

The hurdle comes when Keith makes a clean slice in Shiro’s arm and watches with horror as it seals itself immediately, bloodless.

“Well, I need _some_ of your blood,” he says, crossing his arms. Shiro assists, hoping his willingness will prove to Keith that he’s telling the truth, but Keith only scowls harder, consulting multiple books at once.

“Do you have any holy oil?” Shiro asks. An unnecessary risk, perhaps, but he senses that Keith’s trust is hard-won.

“No, I haven’t been to Jerusalem lately,” Keith says snidely, and Shiro recognises sarcasm.

“Then you will have no proof.”

Keith lies back, resting his head on the bed, the delicacy of his throat bared to Shiro’s gaze. “Show me your powers,” he says, eyes still burning into Shiro’s.

“Telekinesis.” Shiro hesitates. “Flight.”

“I said _show_ me.”

The bare motel room doesn’t provide much inspiration. Keith’s knife had been relegated to the desk when he’d finished prodding Shiro. He opens his hand and palms it.

Keith sits up with alarming speed. “Give me that,” he snaps, and Shiro passes it over without a word. “What else?”

Shiro makes a face. “These things aren’t out of the ordinary for me,” he reminds Keith. “What if I asked you to do something human?”

“I’d leave,” Keith mutters. Shiro suspects he wasn’t intended to hear it, and pretends as such. “Make the lights flicker.”

Despite the words, Keith still jumps when Shiro honours his request.

“Can you set off a car alarm?”

Shiro detects ten vehicles in the parking lot outside and triggers all of them to see how Keith reacts. He’s delighted when Keith actually laughs, a sound Shiro didn’t know how badly he’d wanted to hear. He enjoys amusing Keith, even with such trivial things as his abilities.

“Okay, stop,” Keith says, visibly fighting a smile. “You’ve just ruined a bunch of people’s nights.”

The faint thud of a headboard against the wall next door stops, though, and Shiro is glad of that. Being on Earth is more sensory data than he’s ever had access to in all his millennia; too many sights, sounds, smells, sensations to process at once. Shiro’s grateful for the all-consuming burn of Keith’s soul, an anchor he clings to in the roiling tides of Earth’s information.

“What do you see when you look at me?” Keith asks, as though reading Shiro’s thoughts. He isn’t, Shiro reassures himself – humans are so far from telepathy they can’t even interpret each other’s actions most of the time. Keith merely happens to be remarkably skilled at cutting to the heart of a matter.

The heart residing in this vessel does not belong to Shiro by any means, but it is what he thinks of. One doesn’t require a physical heart to have an emotional heart, he knows – human idioms may be convoluted, but that one has always stuck with him. He will have to meditate on the matter later: his mind is making troubling connections when it comes to Keith, and Shiro refuses to let his emotions steal another opportunity from him. Even if his charge is also his soulmate.

“Your soul,” he answers, only slightly delayed. Keith’s gaze is piercing, as though he could see Shiro’s soul, too. “I see your body second, and your soul first.”

Keith snorts. “Makes a change.”

“They exist in different realms, and my sight is accustomed to the first.”

He expects Keith to ask what his soul looks like – all humans do. Humans are gifted with endless curiosity, following it to the ends of the earth if they have to, but Keith sits in increasingly stony silence, expression growing stormy as his thoughts darken. Shiro stays out of his head, as he will until given Keith’s permission, but he suspects he isn’t the only one experiencing intense emotions.

“What do you want?” Keith sounds tired suddenly, and Shiro wonders what darkness his thoughts have turned to so soon after sharing laughter with him. He glances at the bed with its neat corners and ironed sheets, and wonders if Keith has used it since arriving. He had felt Keith arrive here yesterday, felt the key in his own newly-human hand and known it was to be the place of their meeting.

The clock with its glowing green hands tells Shiro it is 11:34pm. “For you to sleep,” he tells Keith, whose eyes narrow. Shiro wonders if Keith assumes that everyone is a threat and everything is an attack. The word in English is _paranoid_ , but it feels unfair to classify him so. It is likely an advantage as a hunter to mistrust everything one sees.

“Fine,” Keith says. “Easier to kill me in my sleep anyway.”

“I will watch over you,” Shiro says. For reasons he cannot fathom, Keith goes still, his body a line of tension. Shiro thinks Keith is struggling to classify him, too; life is harder when you can’t write everyone off.

“Whatever,” Keith says. He goes into the adjoining room, shaking his head when Shiro tries to follow, and returns after only minutes, hair damp and curling and wearing only trousers of a softer material than denim. The light is extinguished by Keith’s finger on the switch, and Shiro watches him cross the room by moonlight.

“Look, sit down or something,” Keith says as he slides between the sheets, kicking until they come untucked. “If I wake up to you standing over me, I _will_ stab you again.”

“There is no point,” Shiro reminds him, but obediently drops into the hard-backed chair by the window. “Goodnight, Keith.”

He sits patiently for five minutes of silence before Keith whispers, “Goodnight,” and Shiro smiles where Keith cannot see him.

It would be more efficient to retreat into himself, to focus on the mending of his vessel’s clothes and attend to any discomfort within the body, but Shiro’s uninterrupted gaze is rewarded when Keith turns over, head shifting from his arm. His bare wrist faces the ceiling, and Shiro does not need to move to see the Enochian sigils there. The sight of them warms his vessel’s heart.

 

* * *

 

“This town’s got a demon problem,” Keith tells him in the morning. Shiro feigns interest in the newspapers Keith’s spread over their breakfast table, shooting their waitress a placating smile when she raises an eyebrow at the display. “Black coffee, please. What do you want?”

“I don’t eat or drink,” Shiro informs her, “but thank you for your service.”

“Sure thing,” she says, barely suppressing an eye-roll.

Keith doesn’t even wait until she’s out of earshot before continuing, “Family members ‘going crazy’, livestock going missing, reports of black smoke all over the shop. Typical demon shit.”

“Demon shit,” Shiro echoes, and doesn’t understand why that of all things makes Keith crack a smile. “Are they the most powerful creature your knife can handle?” He doesn’t mean to sound derisive, but Keith’s smile disappears in favour of a scowl.

“They’re one of the most powerful creatures that exist to me,” he says, emphasising the last part. “So my knife serves me just fine.”

He glances up then, and seems to startle when he realises Shiro was already looking at him. Keith’s eyes are dark, shining almost purple under the diner’s fluorescent lights, and Shiro wonders if Keith knows his eyes are like the nebulae in the far reaches of the universe.

“I exist to you.”

“Don’t be so certain,” Keith says, gaze dropping back to the table. “Besides, I can’t kill you.”

“Correct,” Shiro says.

“No need to be so smug.” Keith folds the newspapers with little precision, creasing new folds into the surfaces and shoving the whole lot into the beat-up messenger bag at his feet.

He accepts his coffee from the waitress, rejecting her offers of milk and sugar, and raises the mug to his lips heedless of the steam rising from the surface. Shiro raises a hand and lowers the liquid’s temperature, and Keith goes to wince at the movement but settles for narrowing his eyes instead.

“It was boiling,” Shiro says, unsure why Keith’s reaction is making his own cheeks heat. _Embarrassment_ , his mind supplies, though he doesn’t know why. Stopping Keith from scalding the delicate skin of his mouth and throat is not being overprotective.

“I’ll live,” Keith says ironically. He doesn’t offer thanks, but his mouth twitches with a smile.

Outside, Keith tosses his bags into the trunk of his car, cherry-coloured and lighter than the red leather jacket Keith tugs closer around himself in the chill. Keith was made for red, Shiro thinks.

“What now?” he asks instead of putting voice to his dangerous thoughts.

“Lucky us,” Keith says brightly. “We get to go canvassing.”

They return to Keith’s room, where he makes Shiro turn his back as he changes into an outfit resembling the formalwear angels prefer to wear on Earth and not dissimilar to what Shiro himself is wearing. Where Shiro’s coat is beige and seems not to offer much protection against the elements, Keith’s is black and wool, and the angles of his face seem more pronounced beside it.

Keith’s examining a wallet displaying a plastic card and an unidentifiable badge and Shiro steps closer, curious. However, when Keith turns, he’s tucking it into the pocket of his blazer and comes to a sudden stop before their chests can brush.

Keith looks him up and down slowly, eyes seeming to drag over every inch of the vessel’s body, and Shiro shifts, surprised but not uncomfortable. When their eyes meet, Keith coughs and turns his attention to the bag he has already packed and fastened. Shiro suspects he is attempting to cover some misstep, though he doesn’t know what this could be.

“What you’re wearing is fine,” Keith says gruffly, back turned. “Let’s go.”

Keith is a reckless driver.

Shiro knows this not from Keith himself, but from pedestrians turning their heads as Keith’s car whips past, and the horns of other drivers expressing their discontent at Keith’s driving. Never before has he perceived a threat to his immortality; this might be it.

“Your driving is frightening,” Shiro comments.

Keith looks at him far too long for someone who is supposed to keep his eyes on the road. “Don’t usually have anyone here to complain.”

“Now you do.”

“Yeah,” Keith says thoughtfully. “You’d save me though, wouldn’t you? Being my guardian angel.”

“I’ll always save you, Keith,” Shiro says. Keith makes an unpleasant sound, as though he had something caught in his throat, and coughs heartily, knuckles going white on the steering wheel. Shiro watches the road for him, but they’re going fast enough that no one’s in their way and everyone else is keeping their distance. When Keith recovers, Shiro adds, “If you died, I would bring you back.”

“Well, that’s comforting,” Keith mutters.

“Yes,” Shiro says, pleased Keith thinks so. They lapse into silence, and Shiro turns his attention to the vehicle.

There is something impressive about human innovation, as though they were determined to create the power their natural physiology lacks. They had started with fire, the wheel, rudimentary weapons – and now they have advanced enough to trap angels in alarmingly confining spaces in an imitation of flight.

Shiro is grateful Keith does not seem likely to travel by aeroplane anytime soon.

Upon Keith’s next turning, they begin to enter a neighbourhood far different from the one Keith’s motel is situated in. These houses shine, lined up like slices of wedding cake, frosted and identical. Keith makes a clicking sound with his tongue, and when Shiro looks at him his expression is pinched, disapproving.

He notices Shiro looking.

“Fancy neighbourhood,” he supplies. “Rich people with sticks up their asses.”

Shiro’s eyes widen. “That sounds – “

“It’s a metaphor,” Keith says, rolling his eyes. “Don’t worry your angelic little head about it.”

Shiro frowns, and in the time it takes to parse Keith’s meaning, Keith’s out of the car.

“Surprised they noticed people were being bigger assholes than usual,” he says when Shiro joins him.

“Why?”

“Rich people are assholes,” Keith says, tone making it clear that this should be an obvious statement.

“It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle,” Shiro quotes, “than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God.”

Keith slams the trunk, and Shiro doesn’t startle only through immense restraint. His siblings are calm and unruffled at all times; Shiro thinks ruefully he ought to practise the skill.

“Let’s go,” Keith says, clearing his throat. Shiro notes that Keith deepens his voice when he feels awkward or uncomfortable and hopes to minimise causing this in future. “First up, Mrs. Potter, who ratted out her dear sister.”

“Her ‘ratting out’ can only be an advantage to you,” Shiro points out. Keith doesn’t dignify him with a response. They aren’t far from the house, and it isn’t long before they’re stepping under a gleaming porch bookended by meticulously-trimmed plants.

“Come here a moment,” Keith says. When Shiro turns to face him, Keith’s hands go to Shiro’s tie, tightening it in a surprisingly delicate movement. Shiro watches his face as he concentrates, observing the rush of blood to Keith’s cheeks when he looks up and meets Shiro’s eyes.

“Thank you,” Shiro says belatedly. Keith blinks, turns away, and knocks on the door.

It’s answered by a plump woman in her fifties, and Keith shows her the wallet with its card and badge and tells her his name is Agent Riker. “This is Agent,” he starts, looking at Shiro, and stops.

“Shirogane,” Shiro cuts in before the silence becomes suspicious.

The woman extends a hand, saying, “Mrs. Potter,” in a sickly-sweet tone Shiro knows is not her true voice, and Shiro glances down at her open palm. The worst of human blunders are often covered with a polite smile, his studies suggest. Shiro smiles, showing his teeth.

Keith glances at him and his expression goes pained. He clumsily takes Mrs. Potter’s hand with his own right hand, shaking it once and dropping it quickly. “Sorry,” he mutters, and Shiro wonders why he is apologising, but Keith quickly follows up with, “Could we come in?”

Mrs. Potter welcomes them in with genuine hospitality, but her eyes wander over them frequently. A peek at her thoughts reveals she thinks Keith is a _very handsome young man, I wouldn’t mind him mowing my lawn_.

Shiro coughs inelegantly and wonders why the thought tugs at him too.

They’re directed to sit on a sofa covered with entirely too many throw cushions, forcing them both to the edge of their seats and giving them the appearance of being ready to bolt. Perhaps it’s by design, Shiro muses; this room is for hosting, not for living in.

Their hostess bustles back in with a tray, setting it on a doily on the coffee table and gifting them an affected smile. “Some tea for you boys,” she says. “You must be working so hard.”

Keith thinks _Ugh, tea_ with such vitriol Shiro hears it like Keith had shouted it aloud.

“Thank you,” Shiro says, his role of being the polite one becoming clearer by the second, “but I can’t – “

“He can’t drink caffeine,” Keith interrupts. “It’s an, uh, intestinal problem.”

Mrs. Potter’s eyes slide back to Shiro, slightly narrowed, and Shiro nods vigorously. “Yes.”

“Okay, sweetie,” she says. The momentary awkward silence that falls between them reminds Shiro this is Keith’s forte, not his, and Keith likely has this interrogation business down to an art. He cuts his gaze at Keith just enough to give him a small nod.

Keith clears his throat. “Mrs. Potter,” he says, “when did you notice a change in your sister?”

“Three days ago,” she says immediately, as though she had been waiting for him to ask. “I invited her to tea, and do you know what she said?” She waits expectantly for Keith to shake his head. “She told me she couldn’t stand my tea parties, and wouldn’t come to another as long as she lived!”

“My goodness,” Keith says dryly.

“Of course, she’s always thought that,” Mrs. Potter continues, her preoccupation with the story fortunately preventing her from witnessing Keith’s wince as he sips scalding tea. He casts Shiro an imploring look, and Shiro lowers the temperature without raising his hand. “But she would _never_ tell me to my face. It’s been so hard for us since our father died – “

Keith takes a large gulp of tea. Shiro folds his hands in his lap, transfixed by the row of porcelain dolls on the shelf behind Mrs. Potter’s head. She continues in the same vein for a long time before Keith carefully interrupts, asking where her sister is now.

“She’s taken to hanging around the diner on the other side of town.” Mrs. Potter sniffs disapprovingly. “With all sorts of hoodlums and – and _gangsters_.”

“We’ll be sure to check it out,” Keith consoles. “Thank you for your time.”

“Thank you,” Shiro echoes. When they part at the front door, he offers Mrs. Potter his hand, confident of the technique since watching Keith. He shakes it and maintains the hold until Mrs. Potter’s smile goes strained and she pulls away.

“Thank you again,” she says, and shuts the door harder than necessary.

Keith takes Shiro’s arm, turning them around and leading them from the property. They stop on the other side of Mrs. Potter’s white picket fence, and Keith hesitates.

“What is it?” Shiro asks.

“Shirogane’s a weird name for an angel,” Keith says. Despite the bluntness, Shiro suspects it is not what Keith intended to say, not what Keith has been stewing over all this time.

“We aren’t all named Gabriel,” Shiro replies. He considers making a comment about not all humans being called _Adam_ and _Eve_ , but refrains out of a desire for peace between them.

Keith runs his tongue over his teeth, and Shiro finds himself unable to look away. “You’re being suspicious,” Keith says eventually.

“How so?”

“This is your first stint on Earth, right?”

He hadn’t told Keith as such. “Yes.”

“Right,” Keith says. “It shows.”

“I can improve,” Shiro says, tone going pleading. “Or I can be silent.”

“Look, get back in the car,” Keith says, frustrated. The toe of his shoe drags a noisy line in the gravel. “I work better alone.”

Shiro thinks it prudent not to voice his displeasure, and returns obediently to the car. It’s not as though he can’t physically see Keith, he reasons, gaze tracking Keith to the next house, and there is no place on Earth Keith could hide from Shiro’s angelic sight.

He watches as Keith performs the same rituals – the flipping open of the wallet, the polite handshake – and wonders if it is significant that Keith becomes more physically expressive when playing a part, hands moving as he talks. Perhaps that is more human.

The next meeting doesn’t appear to yield information they can use; Keith looks towards Shiro and shakes his head before heading to the next house.

It’s only moments before Shiro knows something is wrong.

Casting a quick glance along the street, Shiro flies to Keith’s location and lands in an equally ostentatious living room. He finds Keith struggling for breath, an elderly man who couldn’t have been taller than five foot three holding his throat in a vice-like grip. Keith’s feet kick desperately at the wall behind him for purchase, his knife having already clattered to the floor.

The man lets go, his eyes dissolving into darkness as he turns to face Shiro, letting Keith fall. The demon raises a hand but Shiro is quicker, his palm on the man’s forehead preventing him from flight.

“Keith, are you alright?” he asks without diverting his gaze.

Keith’s coughing and spluttering, doubled over and clutching his knife to his chest. “I’m fine,” he wheezes.

“A guardian angel?” sneers the demon, his smile revealing yellowed teeth. “How sweet.”

“What is your business here?” Shiro asks, unyielding. The man only smiles wider and Shiro changes tactics, beginning to pull at threads of the demon inside. “You will tell us.”

The demon begins to struggle but Shiro holds him fast, immune to the growing groans of pain. “Keith Kogane,” the demon gasps. “Hell wants him.”

“Why?” Shiro demands. Keith comes to his side, staring the demon in the face as its knees begin to buckle. “ _Answer_ me.”

The demon will soon lose its ability to reply, so Shiro tightens his grip, pausing the slow exorcism but not allowing the demon to coalesce as one being. Black smoke hangs thick around them.

“He’s one of our own,” the demon grits out, breath coming fast and pained. “The Knights want to _recruit_ him, this town was just bait – “

“Why me?” Keith’s knife twitches in his hand, but Shiro knows he cannot allow harm to come to the innocent man who had no choice in hosting a demon. “What do you mean, _one of our own_?”

“You never knew your mother, did you?” asks the demon. From Keith’s intake of breath, Shiro assumes this to be true, resuming the exorcism with a thought. “Don’t trust Feathers here,” leaves the demon in a gasp, “the angels want you dead.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ooh baby do u know what that’s worth, ooh heaven is a place on earth
> 
> next chapter should be up next saturday!


	2. Chapter 2

Shiro spreads his palm flat and expels the demon, watching Keith duck as black smoke pours from the man’s mouth. Unphased, Shiro holds him still until the demon has been fully exorcised. When man drops to the floor, Shiro touches Keith’s shoulder and then they are beside the car, Keith stumbling and nearly falling in his disorientation.

“Don’t touch me,” Keith spits at him.

“We should go back to the motel,” Shiro says, feeling similarly disoriented. Heaven could not want Keith dead – they assigned Shiro to _guard_ him. However, it feels too easy to assume the demon was lying. Angels do not possess a moral compass; angels follow orders.

“No,” Keith says. His knife, still in his hand from before the flight, is held aloft in front of him. Shiro categorises it as Keith’s ‘safety net’. “I’m not going anywhere with you. Let me go.”

“I cannot do that, Keith.” Shiro tilts his head to the side. “You are mine to protect.”

Keith shoulders go straight, chest puffing up as he assumes a combat position. Shiro does not react. This neighbourhood need not witness Keith pump his vessel full of useless blades and bullets. If they must fight, Shiro would prefer to try reason first.

“I’m not _your_ anything,” Keith hisses. Despite his words, he does not move to get in the car, or even to move at all. Shiro looks deeper into his eyes, glances at his soul, and realises Keith is, once again, afraid of him.

“It isn’t me you should fear,” Shiro says. “It isn’t safe here. Let us talk this out where I can protect you.”

“Can’t you protect me here?” Keith asks, tone mocking, biting.

Shiro wills himself not to lose patience. Humans are tumultuous creatures indeed. “I can ward our room against angels,” he says, and it feels like a confession. It is a betrayal, but on what scale Shiro is unsure.

“Fine,” Keith snaps. He flinches when Shiro lays a hand on his shoulder, and one on the car, and takes them to the motel parking lot.

Keith storms inside, leaving Shiro to follow at a more leisurely pace. He does not mind walking, and it gives him the opportunity to practise his polite smile on the spooked receptionist. He has the feeling he will offer many polite smiles in Keith’s fiery wake.

The door is slammed in his face, and lacking a key, Shiro simply appears on the other side of it. His appearance adds tension to Keith’s scowl.

Shiro is ignored, for those first few minutes. Keith is still breathing heavily, his face red and fingers trembling, and Shiro does not comment when Keith disappears into the adjoining room. The sound of water running is pleasant, despite the creaking pipes, and far more peaceful than when Keith slams back into the room.

He is just as red, damp and humid like the air that washes from the room behind him, but his soul is calmer. He changes without a word, uncaring of Shiro’s presence or the sigils on his wrist, and then he sits on the edge of the bed and finally makes eye contact. The gift of Keith’s gaze brings Shiro to acknowledge he had feared that Keith would never look at him again.

“Did you know?” Keith says quietly.

Shiro stares at him with wide eyes.

“I said,” Keith’s voice is little more than a hiss, “did you _know_?” He’s twirling the knife in his hand, and Shiro swallows despite knowing Keith cannot hurt him.

“No. I swear.” There is something more significant to humans, something that reassures them. Shiro rifles through his memories, his studies, and comes up with a word whose connotation gives it weight. “I promise,” he says, the word foreign on his tongue.

Keith laughs, the sound startling. “You promise,” he mutters.

“I do.” Shiro licks his lips, a human habit he has become accustomed to in the short time he has spent with Keith; a redundant action as his vessel cannot dehydrate. “I do not know your heritage,” he continues. “I was assigned to protect you. It is an honour, to become a Guardian.”

“A double-blind experiment,” Keith says, “don’t you think?”

It takes a moment to understand his meaning. Shiro gives it some thought: that his being assigned was for the purpose of monitoring Keith. Perhaps this was the first test of his loyalty; perhaps he is intended to kill Keith for being an abomination, just as they are expected to remove Nephilim. It is some cruel joke, handing Shiro happiness on a silver platter, his own charge to protect, and tasking him with his soulmate’s assassination.

But even his angelic sight cannot retrieve any traces of demon in Keith. The darkness around his soul is a lack of trust, not a lack of goodness, virtue, purity. His soul has not been twisted; was not created different.

Shiro wonders who gave the order, if an archangel could see darkness where he can’t. The thought twists something unpleasant inside him.

“You are my soulmate,” he says, something comforting in the words. The set of Keith’s shoulders relaxes. “I – I cannot imagine bringing you to harm, guardian or not.”

“Doesn’t sound like the choice is yours,” Keith says flippantly, and Shiro wants to shake him, wants to say _I will not hurt you_ until both of them believe it.

“How could I be a half-breed?” Keith asks, moving on swiftly enough that suspicion gathers between them like a cloud. Shiro recognises it as a rhetorical question, but guilt floods him as Keith turns desperate eyes on him. “I can touch holy water! I can walk through a Devil’s Trap, so what the fuck – “

“If your mother was a demon,” Shiro says, regretting his words at Keith’s hushed breath, “and she took a vessel…” His brow furrows, unable to comprehend it. “I do not understand,” he finally admits. “I have heard of cambion, but there has not been one in some time. Their powers do not manifest unless Lucifer walks the Earth.”

He shudders to think what would have happened if he’d met Keith during the apocalypse; soulmate or not, Keith’s potential is a horrifying thought – doubly so if Lucifer had already twisted Keith’s mind to his purpose.

“Humans and angels can breed,” Keith says. His voice is rough, as though his throat was sore. Shiro focuses, meaning to heal it, but Keith’s rasp is not due to physical pain. “Can’t they?”

“Yes,” Shiro says. “Nephilim. Their existence is always fatal to the human mother.” He has never encountered a cambion, nor does he know much about them. They are an apocalyptic phenomena, one Shiro had not expected to face for many years yet.

This time, Keith does not disguise his horror, the edges of grief creeping into his tone. “My mother,” he starts, and cannot finish.

Shiro frowns and changes the subject, meaning to distract Keith. “You said angels did not exist,” he accuses. “Why do you know of Nephilim?”

“Every hunter’s read the Bible,” Keith says uncomfortably.

“There are angels in the Bible.”

Keith puffs up again, and Shiro sits in the desk chair to lessen their height difference. It is still a moment before Keith speaks.

“If the choice was between thinking everyone in Heaven doesn’t care, or thinking they don’t exist, what would you choose?”

Shiro is silent, the words ringing true even as he wishes they didn’t. “Your soul words,” he says instead. “Did they not suggest something you had not yet encountered, could not comprehend?”

“I didn’t know what they were,” Keith says, angry again, standing up and beginning to pace. “What was I supposed to do, waking up on my sixteenth birthday to some kind of curse on my arm? Thank God?”

 _Yes_ , Shiro thinks, _because it is what I did_. “It is not a curse,” he says quietly.

“What language is it?”

“Enochian,” Shiro says, and with the admission realises he had forgotten to ward the room.

He stands at the same moment Allura appears.

The lioness of her true-form bares her teeth, eyes rolling white and wide, and Shiro forces himself to focus on her vessel’s face, which is unsmiling.

“Allura,” he says, speaking automatically in Enochian, and Keith backs away, cognizant of the threat and standing shoulder to shoulder with Shiro.

She replies in English, and Shiro wonders what she could possibly have to say that she wants Keith to hear. “Shiro,” she says sadly. “I am so sorry.”

Shiro flexes his wings, both grateful and unsettled that it is her. “What do you want?”

“There was a time you would trust my words without question,” she bites back, responding to his fury in kind. “I fear this time you will go too far.”

“Don’t talk about me like I’m not here,” Keith interrupts, and as Allura’s gaze snaps to him, her Grace pulses with curiosity. Shiro wonders if she sees something he cannot.

“Very well,” Allura says. “I am only here to warn you, Shiro. Sendak would have my Grace if he knew.”

Of course it is Sendak.

“Warn us?” Keith says, speaking for both of them. Allura’s head tilts to the side as she regards the human; Shiro senses both curiosity and revulsion. Allura has not visited Earth since before the creation of humans.

“They are coming for you,” she says, addressing them both. “I cannot provide you with evidence, but what you suspect is true. Heaven cannot abide it; leaving a cambion alive is too big a risk.”

Shiro wants to speak in Enochian, to prevent Keith from hearing, but that would not improve his standing with Keith. Some smaller part of him suggests he wants Allura to be the one to say it, so the cursed order would not leave his own mouth, so he would not have to look at Keith as he hears it.

“Must I be the one to carry it out?” Shiro asks.

“I do not know,” Allura tells him. Her eyes are on Keith, but Shiro cannot bring himself to look at his soulmate’s expression. “Sendak will visit you and give the order. I cannot say when. Perhaps three more of your Earth days.”

Keith says nothing. Shiro has the inexplicable urge to take his hand.

“Thank you,” he says instead.

“Do not tell me of your plans,” Allura says, her true-form beginning to shift, wings spreading, hooves lifting. “I will stay out of this.”

Allura’s vessel shifts, too, and Shiro catches sight of words on her upper arm.

Words, not sigils.

“Your soulmate,” he blurts out, and Allura gives him a sad smile.

“One day,” she says, and disappears.

Keith’s breath shudders from him, his posture relaxing. “God, what the fuck,” he says. Shiro gets the impression he is not praying.

He cannot think of a response, and feels woefully inadequate when Keith turns doleful eyes on him.

“What is a cambion, anyway?”

“Half-human,” Shiro says. Just these words make Keith flinch, and it is difficult to continue, “Half-demon. Nephilim are perhaps their only equivalent when they reach full power.” He hesitates. “The full extent of their abilities are not known.”

“Because they’re all dead,” Keith supplies, “and Lucifer’s still burning down there. I got that, thanks.”

“Cambion would be an unparalleled force in the fight against Heaven.” The statement forces Shiro to consider how Heaven would retaliate – demons have no qualms about producing cambion, but Nephilim are strictly forbidden. Could there be a future in which Nephilim are produced as weapons for the apocalypse?

It does not bear thinking about.

“So Hell wants to recruit me,” Keith says. His laugh is humourless and disagreeable to Shiro’s ears. “First real job I’d ever have,” he adds with a snort, but Shiro knows without glancing at his soul that Keith is making a joke, and is not considering Hell’s proposal. Keith is ignorant; not bad, or wrong. Not evil.

His viable choices are joining Hell or being killed by Heaven, and Shiro cannot help but feel pride that his soulmate will not take the easy option. The goodness he had sensed in Keith burns brighter than ever.

Instead of doing something logical like talk or plan, Keith insists on a solitary trip around the corner while Shiro wards the room. He returns with a bottle of dark amber liquid and a smug smile.

Shiro merely watches the human go about his business, vessel immobile as he focuses on angels speaking on Earth. The clipped and guttural sounds of Enochian are soothing after more than one Earth day of conversing with humans in English, but Shiro listens intently for any mention of Keith, the half-breed, the abomination, anything he can think to listen for.

So focused is he that when Keith waves a hand in front of his face and pokes his shoulder, Shiro’s blade emerges from his sleeve and into his hand.

“Jesus,” Keith says, stumbling back. His demeanour has changed: his eyes are glazed and unfocused, his movements halting, and his thoughts are thick as though encased in syrup. Shiro dematerialises his blade and stands up.

“My apologies,” he says.

“Guessin’ you had that in your pocket,” Keith mumbles, “and you weren’t just happy to see me.”

“I am always happy to see you, Keith.”

He doesn’t understand why Keith bursts out laughing, the sound raw and untamed and wholly superior to the time he had amused Keith with car alarms.

“What was that?” Keith asks. Shiro supposes it is not dangerous to tell him the truth; it isn’t like Keith will ever get his hands on one.

“My angel blade,” he says. “Capable of killing most creatures, including angels.”

Keith bites his lip, contemplating Shiro’s face. “I’m glad I didn’t have one,” he says. “When we met.”

It is a strange compliment, to be told _I’m glad I didn’t kill you_ , but Shiro is grateful nonetheless. “I am as well.” He pauses. “Why are you intoxicated?”

Keith’s expression was halfway to fond, but the question makes him scowl. “Because I’m probably gonna die tomorrow.”

“You enjoy being in this state?”

“This state,” Keith says with feeling, “is all that’s keeping me from some major breakdown.” His breath catches, as if he had not intended to be so honest.

“It is not over yet,” Shiro says firmly. “We still have ‘demon shit’ to solve here.”

Keith laughs, the sound muted and wrong. “And afterwards? You know, I always thought my soulmate would do anything for me, but your job is to put a bullet in me, isn’t it?”

“I would do anything for you,” Shiro blurts out, surprising even himself. Keith’s eyes widen as he topples backwards, finding purchase on the bed. “I have waited millennia for our meeting.”

“Sounds pretty lonely,” Keith says carefully.

Shiro had not thought it lonely at the time. Heaven was always preoccupied and Shiro had been with his garrison, training into and then fulfilling the role of a warrior, fighting Michael’s wars. He finds now, however, that eons of waiting with bated breath pale in comparison to having Keith here with him, warm and smiling and painfully, beautifully _alive_.

“It was,” he says. “But you are worth it.”

“You probably already looked,” Keith says, rolling up his sleeve, and Shiro feels a flash of guilt for having done so, “but here. I want you to see.”

Shiro stands from the chair, hesitantly approaching Keith, who sits up and offers his arm. The sigils are large, and it occurs to Shiro that Keith had a difficult time concealing them from people who might wish to do him harm, or even people he trusted, because –

“You thought your soulmate was a monster,” Shiro says quietly.

Keith bites his lip, eyes almost apologetic. “In my line of work,” he says with a shrug, “nothing else it could’ve been. Not human, that’s for damn sure.” When Shiro reaches out, he expects Keith to flinch back, but Keith allows him to lay gentle fingertips on his skin, tracing the shapes. “But I’ve hunted vampires, and Djinns, and werewolves, and God knows what else. None of your basic monsters have a language, let alone one like this.”

“Did you ever believe in angels?”

“When I was younger, maybe,” Keith says. A sharp tug to Shiro’s arm brings him down to sit beside Keith, thighs touching, but Shiro does not release Keith’s wrist, studying the sigils. It is merely his name, but the sight of it on Keith’s skin is breathtaking nonetheless. “But I stopped when I got older, like everyone else. And I’d have to be pretty arrogant to assume my soulmate was an angel.”

“Fair enough,” Shiro allows, finally letting go. Keith seems… disappointed.

“I showed you mine,” he says. “Show me yours.”

Shiro has to shrug out of his trench-coat, making it easier to roll up the sleeves of his blazer and shirt. He shows Keith his name, the curl of English strange on his vessel’s skin.

“Sorry you got stuck with me.”

“I’m not,” Shiro tells him, and Keith’s mouth shuts with an audible click.

“How could you see them, before?” he asks.

“Our words appear on our true-form,” Shiro says. “It is less about seeing them, and more… that we can feel them. Our forms are so large and made of so many different parts I believe it quite impossible to find them on ourselves.”

“Could I see your true-form?”

Shiro wishes he could. “To look upon it would burn out your eyes.”

Keith laughs, mutters, “Figures,” under his breath, and traces the scrawl of his handwriting on Shiro’s vessel.

It gets late, sky darkening to black outside as Shiro watches Keith finish the bottle, lips coming free from the neck of it with a quiet _pop_ sound before tossing it aside.

Keith changes into his sleeping outfit with little ceremony, unselfconscious as he throws his shirt aside, glancing at Shiro so quickly he nearly misses it.

“Here, I’ll stick the TV on so you have something to do,” Keith says afterwards. He climbs into bed, propping himself up with pillows, and pats the space next to him. Shiro acquiesces, sitting on top of the covers as Keith wriggles underneath them.

“Angels do not require entertainment,” Shiro informs him, but Keith lights up the grey box anyway. It depicts a living room populated by four humans and the canned laughter grates on Shiro’s nerves, so he listens to Keith instead, who huffs amused breaths from his nose instead of laughing.

It is thirty-seven minutes before Shiro registers Keith has fallen asleep. He brushes Keith’s soul, finding that he will not be easily woken, but lowers the volume regardless as he changes the channel.

The programme he finds depicts God’s creatures with a calm, knowledgeable voiceover, and is infinitely preferable to watching the habits of humans. Shiro watches the roar of a male lion and is reminded of his true-form, more familiar to him than his current vessel’s cage of fabric and flesh.

Keith wakes as the sun rises with a pained groan, cracking his neck and grumbling about having fallen asleep sitting up. Shiro turns off the television and watches Keith attend to human responsibilities. Keith doesn’t stop complaining throughout his morning routine, and it isn’t until Keith says, “My head is pounding,” that Shiro realises the problem.

He receives a wary look from Keith as he approaches, but Keith allows him to touch two fingers to his temple and alleviate the pain.

“You’re a walking hangover cure,” Keith says, immensely pleased. Shiro believes this is a compliment. “Wanna get breakfast?”

“No,” Shiro says, lacking the biological need to eat, and Keith rolls his eyes at the mistake.

He eats quickly, gulping down almost all of his black coffee in one go, and Shiro is pleased to see him eating, knowing Keith will function better on a full stomach.

The diner Mrs. Potter had described isn’t far, but Shiro is relieved to get out of the car, stretching his wings. Keith gives him a sidelong look, curious, but their attention is caught by the restaurant’s front door as it bangs open. The parking lot is empty. Shiro is grateful there are no civilians besides the poor souls playing unhappy hosts to demons. He feels eyes on them, but when he looks to the windows, there’s nothing there.

Keith’s loading up: he tucks his knife into his belt and multiple bottles and flasks into his pockets. Shiro concentrates and determines them to be holy water.

“There are only seven of them,” he says after focusing on the diner. Seven demons milling around in flesh-suits identical to Shiro’s own. However, where Shiro asked and was accepted, demons only possess, consume, _take_. It is unfortunate that they cannot spare all seven human lives.

“Only,” Keith mutters. “That’d be a handful on my own, you know.”

“You are not alone, Keith.” He cannot see Keith’s reaction, but it is another moment before Keith shuts the trunk, the slam loud in the deserted lot. Keith brushes Shiro’s elbow with his own before setting off.

Shiro follows behind, but when they reach the door he appears in front of Keith with one flap of his wings. Keith’s annoyed grunt is drowned out by the clash of blades as a demon takes aim at Shiro from the doorway. Shiro holds his blade steady, eventually overpowering the demon and pushing it back beyond the door.

Keith moves in behind him, knife held aloft, and there’s a bustle of movement and noise as the demons mobilise. Demons are scorned for their lack of organisation; far from the easy cohesion of a pack of angels. There is no single-minded purpose with demons - too often they have their own biases, their foolish desires often outweighing the needs of the group.

Shiro has never seen demons unite like this. They lack formation, true, and Shiro can already see how to pick off three more in quick succession, but he observes nods and the exchange of glances between the grunt soldiers and the apparent leader. Shiro will save him for last.

He considers all of this in the scant seconds it takes to sink his blade into the demon’s chest.

“Guardian angel, huh?” someone’s yelling at Keith, who is circling with two knives in hand. “Should’ve known you were too pussy to come alone, half-breed.”

Shiro pauses after summoning another demon to him, grasping its head and barely concentrating as he exorcises it. Keith looks furious, and Shiro thinks about adding a comment – that Keith’s more than capable, that Shiro is here to help him, not shield him.

Instead, he finds himself spellbound by Keith ducking and swiping, eluding the demon long enough for Keith to stab it in the heart, gritting his teeth as electricity crackles in the air and inside the demon, ribs illuminated from behind as the demon crumples to the floor.

His attention is forced back to the fight when the third demon grabs his arm, managing to turn him around before Shiro immobilises himself, still as a stone. The second between Shiro becoming immoveable and the demon letting go is opportunity for Shiro to begin an exorcism.

This demon is stronger, managing to struggle, and Shiro holds it at arm’s length, unable to be harmed by the demon’s rudimentary weapon but preferring to avoid contact. He hears Keith shout in pain and forces the demon out before whipping around to help Keith, having to duck an attack as one of Keith’s two assailants sees him coming.

“A little help?” Keith yells, whirling around with both knives slashing and looking, Shiro thinks, like something of an angel himself.

Shiro exorcises the one in his grip and ends up holding the other still as Keith’s knife descends. Keith’s grin is bloody and a little wild and Shiro can only blink at him, taken aback by his strange beauty.

They turn to the leader as one. The demon hasn’t moved since they entered the room; appears to have been… watching. Just watching, with black eyes fixed on Keith.

“You’re wonderful in action,” says the demon. “Imagine what you will be capable of when Lucifer is freed.”

Shiro remains silent, newfound faith in Keith unwavering. He is rewarded when Keith spits, “I’d never join you.”

“It is your destiny,” the demon says, tilting its head to the side. “You cannot fight it, no matter how you may foolishly try.”

“Yeah?” Keith says, hands clenching into fists. “Killing my parents, was that destiny too?”

The demon says nothing, lips twisting into a cruel smile. Shiro wonders how long their standoff will last; wonders how much longer he will have patience. There is nothing left to learn, after all – only demons to avoid.

Demons with leadership qualities cannot be allowed to continue their existence, however. They are dangerous enough as Lucifer’s minions; the thought of them being able to mobilise independently is, while not terrifying, certainly unsettling.

A pillar of smoke erupts from the woman’s mouth and Shiro flies to her in a rush of wings, clamping one hand over the smoke and forcing it back in. He can sense Keith moving behind him but turns his attention to the demon when it speaks.

“We’ll get our hands on him eventually,” it says, and Shiro allows himself a smirk.

“Go to hell,” he says. Smiting the demon brings a satisfaction Shiro rarely indulges in, but he keeps the light to a minimum out of concern for Keith’s delicate human eyes. When he turns, Keith’s arm is slung over his face, body facing away.

“It’s safe,” Shiro says, consciously gentling his tone.

“What the hell was that?”

“Smiting.”

“Why didn’t you do that earlier?” Keith pants, but he looks reluctantly impressed.

“I wanted to observe you in combat.” It’s the truth. Shiro shouldn’t feel so embarrassed about it. He shouldn’t feel anything.

Truth is, Shiro’s always been a little wayward.

Long before this – before civilisation began, in fact – Shiro was too empathetic, too kind, too _human_. No one could explain it, least of all his creators, and that was what stung the most – that he had been created perfect, but by his own actions became wrong.

It’s something he’s always worked to counteract, throwing himself into every task with twice the determination and courage of those who need not prove themselves. His dedication had made him into a respected warrior, a trusted soldier and ally, and Shiro had basked in pride at being assigned as a guardian, one of the more prestigious roles on Earth.

Even after he had realised his charge was also his soulmate. Sometimes, angelic sight was a bad thing.

Angels with human soulmates are not looked down upon, but at the same time, Shiro tended to feel that he was treated differently after the revelation. He had never met another angel with the same experience – until finding out about Allura, anyway – and had often wondered why this was.

Privately, afraid to even think his own thoughts for fear someone might overhear, Shiro had often wondered if angels are corrupted by their human soulmates, condemned to develop emotions and desires outside of their orders. It makes his assignment to Keith all the more puzzling.

Lost in thought, Shiro misses the first time Keith says his name. “Shiro,” Keith says, tone tinged with impatience. “We’ve got to go. They’ll know something’s up soon enough.”

“Yes,” Shiro says, reaching out to fly them back to the motel, but Keith jerks away.

“We drove here,” he reminds Shiro, who makes a face. What was once a novelty has become a chore, if he’s honest, but he travels with Keith in order to know as much of him as possible.

When they return, Keith hurries to pack up what little of his possessions are scattered around the room. Shiro focuses on looking for any trace of approaching demons, tucking a bottle of holy water into the pocket of his trench-coat. He can sense Keith’s anti-possession tattoo, over the vulnerable heart that beats beneath his rib-cage, and is glad of it.

“Okay,” Keith says, a bag in each hand and the room key dangling from his fingertips. “Let’s go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [insert joke about chapter 3 being uploaded next year]
> 
> hope everyone has a happy new year!!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a belated happy new year to all of you <3

They face no threats on the road, and for that Shiro is relieved. He knows it will not be long before the demons launch another assault and Sendak comes knocking, but they are safe for now, alone on the open road and accompanied only by the restless hum of Keith’s car.

Shiro does not ask where they are going; he suspects the answer will make little difference to him. His attention turns inward, to the chatter of other angels on Earth and the roiling tides of his own emotions. He catches glimpses of Keith’s thoughts, vague things like _Gotta top up the tank_ soon and the occasional flash of fear as the weather turns and thunder cracks sharp in the silence.

“This isn’t an omen, is it?” Keith asks.

Shiro can see the lights of civilisation in the distance and hopes they will stop soon. Keith has driven well into the night, and his biological needs have gone ignored. “No,” he replies. “An angel taking a vessel is – different.”

Before Shiro can suggest a pause in their journey, Keith says, “Next motel I see, we’re stopping. We’ll be safe, right?”

“I imagine we have more time than this,” Shiro says, electing not to bring up Sendak unless strictly necessary. “I will ward the room. There is also a sigil I can teach you.” Keith glances at him for the first time in hours, and something in Shiro lights up.

“Cool,” is all he says. Shiro debated for a while whether to teach Keith the sigil that banishes angels, as successful implementation of it will banish Shiro as well. He decides it is better for Keith to know. It is not as though he can hide himself from Shiro. Not yet, anyway.

When they stop, Shiro senses Keith’s intention to get a room and immediately collapse on the bed. He is just deciding how to phrase that Keith must eat as well when Keith’s stomach rumbles.

“Being human sucks sometimes,” he says with a groan. “Come on. At least McDonald’s is pretty much 24/7.”

Once Keith has his food, greasy burger and fries in an equally greasy bag, they return to the motel. Keith looks dead on his feet, and not for the first time that evening, Shiro wishes he could merely fly them to shelter.

“Can I get a room?” Keith’s saying, muffling a yawn as he proffers a handful of crumpled bills. “One bed.”

The receptionist coughs, drawing Shiro’s attention. The man’s cheeks have coloured as he scribbles Keith’s given name on a notepad – James McCoy, today – and fumbles under the desk for a key. When Shiro looks at Keith, his cheeks are red, too.

He has learned enough to wait until they are out of the receptionist’s earshot before asking, “What embarrassed you both?”

“I’m not embarrassed,” Keith snaps at him. It takes him two tries to get the key in the door. Shiro gravitates to the desk chair, watching Keith as he dumps the bag of food and then himself on the double bed. Keith notices him still looking. “He thought we were a couple.”

“We are,” Shiro says, confused. Keith opens one eye to glare at him. “To him, we are two humans – a couple of humans.”

Keith groans. “Never mind.”

“Very well,” Shiro says. Still mystified, he occupies himself by warding the room, borrowing blood from Keith’s supplies. This time, he ought to remember to remove the wards when they leave.

He sits back down, waiting for Keith to finish eating before offering again to teach him the sigil. Keith is a diligent student, making Shiro draw it multiple times on paper before drawing it himself, copying Shiro’s example to the letter.

“It is activated by touch,” Shiro says, before quickly adding, “Please don’t – it will force me out.”

“Good to know,” Keith says, and it isn’t until Shiro sees the quirk of his lips that he realises Keith is joking.

Keith doesn’t last long after that, copying a banishing sigil onto the door before crawling into bed with clothes still on. It is Shiro who quietly packs away the supplies, bins the remains of Keith’s meal, and turns off the light.

This time when he focuses on angel activity, he knows another has taken a vessel in this area. The signature is fuzzy, as though it has been hidden, and he cannot distinguish the angel’s identity. He lets Keith rest, unsure when they will have the opportunity again.

The next morning, the sun is high in the sky before Keith rises with a groan, rolling his shoulders to stretch the muscles there. “You let me sleep in,” he grumbles.

“You needed to sleep,” Shiro points out, eyes on Keith as he dresses and wanders in and out of the bathroom, toothbrush between his lips as he studies the banishing sigil once more. Keith has decided to move on again, words illuminated by some purpose he doesn't disclose to Shiro. The world rushes past through water-stained car windows and Shiro rests his fingers there, eyes on a planet previously unknown to him.

Shiro is unsure whether to attribute their argument to Keith’s mercurial temperament regarding their relationship or to some true fault of his own, but regardless, it only takes the innocuous question, “Where did you get your knife?” to set Keith off.

“None of your business,” Keith snaps. “Why? You gonna confiscate it?”

“No,” Shiro says, offended and regretting having spoken. “I have never seen one like it.”

“Maybe I got it from my demon mother,” Keith says. He laughs bitterly. “No wonder Dad never talked about her.” Shiro remains silent, head tilting to the side as he regards Keith, whose eyes cut to him for only a second before returning to the road. “Why are you still here, Shiro?”

Shiro opens his mouth to say _You are my charge_ , but the words ring false. If Keith was not his soulmate, he does not know how he would have reacted to the news that Keith is a cambion. The thing keeping him at Keith’s side is not his role as a guardian.

“You are my soulmate,” he says, and the words come out quiet, tone touched by something wistful.

“You don’t know me,” Keith presses.

“No,” Shiro allows. “But I know you are a good person.”

Keith clears his throat. “She said Sendak is coming for me.” Shiro looks away. “Who is he?”

Shiro thinks about fear so potent he could taste it, about snarling teeth and ripping flesh, about the faceless angel who had repaired one of Shiro’s limbs when his Grace was broken so badly he could not mend it himself.

Sendak had always been scornful of humans. It made sense, then, that he despises angels with human soulmates.

“Leader of a garrison,” Shiro chooses to say. “He is… tenacious. Dedicated to his causes.”

He can feel Keith’s gaze on him. “What else?”

“He dispatched the last Nephilim.”

“So he’s making this personal,” Keith says grimly. “He trying to set a record for half-breeds killed, is that it?”

“Do not refer to yourself that way,” Shiro says sharply, the word tugging him from his self-pity.

“It’s all I am to you,” Keith says, derision clear and painful in his tone. “Go to hell.”

“I have already been,” Shiro says, keeping his gaze steady in an attempt to hold Keith’s restless eyes. “It is not an experience I wish to repeat.”

Keith laughs, then. “Fair enough,” he concedes.

“It is not all you are to me,” Shiro says before silence can fall. He cannot abide the thought of his soulmate thinking Shiro dislikes him, or thinks anything less of Keith than that he is strong and deserving of compassion.

“What’s next, then?” Keith asks as though Shiro had not spoken. “Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the protection, but your people are coming for me. If you’re gonna stay out of it, then – you have to go.”

“I am not going anywhere,” Shiro says tentatively. Since Allura’s visit, he is certain that his assignment was a test; one he intends to fail. “When Sendak comes, we will face him together.”

Keith seems to stiffen. “You’d do that?”

“Yes.”

“For me?”

Shiro looks intently at the side of Keith’s face. “Yes.”

The next time they stop, Shiro senses it is for good. Keith checks them into a motel, specifying, “One _single_ bed, please,” but gets right back in the car afterwards, mumbling that there’s something he wants Shiro to see.

When they stop, Keith grabs his bag of supplies from the trunk. Shiro eyes the barn with some trepidation; the boarded-up windows are hardly inviting, and the air reeks of disuse and neglect.

“What do you think?” Keith asks. Shiro decides against saying anything potentially incriminating, but Keith snorts. “Nothin’ special,” he says. “Good place for a showdown, though. Figured the motel wasn’t ideal.”

“I could ward this place until we are ready,” Shiro says, thinking out loud. “We could force a confrontation – let Sendak come to us. He has already taken a vessel.”

Keith’s lips go thin as he considers. “It’d be better this way,” he says after a moment. “No civilians. Get rid of our tail.”

“We cannot outrun Heaven,” Shiro tells him, hesitant but resolute. “Once Sendak is gone, there will be others.”

“So we keep going,” Keith says. His eyes are bright when they meet Shiro’s. “We keep fighting.”

“You trust me,” Shiro realises.

Keith looks uncomfortable, feet shifting as though he wants to run, but he stands his ground. “Yes.”

He has no reason to, Shiro thinks, but the same could be said of his trust in Keith. Nothing connects them – nothing besides the inexplicable words on their wrists, tying them together with a power older than life itself. Shiro had doubted this connection, doubted the supposedly instant bond of trust and love and loyalty, but he feels it now. He wishes he had not spent so many years running from his feelings, because now, with Keith – it feels _right_ in a way mere guardianship had not.

“Why?” he asks, regardless. Keith does not have an angel’s understanding of the ancient power that binds them.

“Because – I care about you.” It looks like it pains Keith to say it, and Shiro tilts his head. A cursory glance at Keith’s roiling emotions isn’t enough to understand.

Keith claps him on the shoulder once, brusque in an action Shiro’s observed in human media.

“I care about you too, Keith,” Shiro says, intending to mimic the action. He raises his hand to Keith’s shoulder and squeezes.

Keith’s cheeks go furiously red. “You can let go now,” he mutters, sounding uncomfortable but speaking too late to stop Shiro noticing Keith had relaxed under his hand.

“My apologies,” Shiro says, smoothly returning his hands to his sides. He feels unbearably smug about Keith’s blush for a reason he can’t quite place.

He demonstrates an angel ward to Keith, finding him an even quicker study than before – Keith had evidently examined Shiro’s previous work – and between the two of them they ward the barn. It will be simple enough for Shiro to strike through them all when it comes time; he has no doubt that within a few days, Sendak will be anxious to complete his mission.

Shiro flies them back to the motel parking lot, conscious of the danger of being exposed on the road. He wards the room himself, often faster than Keith can see, and resigns himself to another evening of wishing Keith would sleep and listening closely to the angels positioned on Earth.

But Keith is no longer restless, and his posture is relaxed as he moves through the dim room. He does not make pointless conversation; the noise that stirs Shiro is the rustle of pages turning. Keith is reading, eyes narrowed and tongue just visible between his lips in his own deep concentration. He possesses many books of lore, and privately Shiro doubts there will be much actionable information, but anything that helps Keith feel more prepared to face Sendak has clear value.

At half past ten, Keith sets the heavy tome down with a thump and says, “I think we should do it tomorrow.”

Shiro agrees: the longer they elude Sendak’s grasp, the more resentful he will grow, becoming even more of a formidable enemy than his current prowess boasts. Sendak fuelled by rage and bitterness at the perceived threat to his abilities is a Sendak more dangerous than Shiro has seen in a long time.

This way, they still have hope of catching him unawares.

“I agree,” Shiro says. “I must ask that you do not interfere.”

Keith’s expression pinches, as Shiro knew it would. “No way,” he says. “I’m not gonna stand meekly off to the side watching you defend my honour.”

“It is your life at stake,” Shiro reminds him.

“Whatever.”

Shiro raises the issue of greatest concern. “Sendak is more powerful than me,” he says, and the admission makes long-healed wounds sting. “There is a ward I can draw to suppress some of his power.”

“Will it affect you?”

“Some.” Shiro stretches his vessel’s legs, attention drawn by the shift of bones under the skin. “But the disadvantage to Sendak is far greater.”

His momentary distraction is enough for him to miss the change in Keith’s expression, some sensitivity to Shiro’s change in tone he had not thought to mask. “You know him,” Keith says. It isn’t a question.

Discomfort expands under Shiro’s skin until he thinks his vessel might burst with it. “Yes.”

“How?”

Shiro doesn’t want to tell him, doesn’t want to place yet another burden upon Keith’s shoulders – for there is no other way Keith will interpret it. “Sendak has no tolerance for angels with human soulmates,” he says carefully. He trains his eyes on the floor, senses attuned to Keith closing the book and giving Shiro his full attention. “They are not uncommon, but there are some – some older angels – who disapprove.”

He hopes Keith will not press, will not stop to consider that it is, in fact, the _task_ of angels to love and guard mankind, but of course he does; Shiro’s brave, brilliant soulmate, whose soul burns for Shiro like a flame.

“Why?”

“I have noticed,” Shiro says to his shoes, “that angels with human soulmates are more likely to develop their own desires and emotions. Angels were made to follow orders, which is why Sendak takes such issue with human soulmates.”

When Keith speaks, his tone is thoughtful. “Have you noticed that in yourself?”

“Yes,” Shiro says, and wishes he could say it without shame. “Long before your birth. Sendak took it upon himself to make me his… personal project.” He thinks about the scars his true-form bears, glad of their absence on his vessel as Keith’s eyes trace the skin he can see.

“Shiro,” Keith says softly, hesitantly. “You don’t have to tell me.”

“I wish to,” Shiro says. It is half a truth: he wishes Keith to know, but he does not wish to tell him. “It seemed as though he thought if he broke me and put me back together, I would become different.”

“You didn’t.”

“I didn’t,” Shiro acknowledges. “I was still experiencing feelings I could not control. I tried to reign myself in, I tried to change, but – I could not be fixed.” Immediately he senses that ‘fixed’ has a different connotation to humans; where angels are machines, humans are living beings who take offence at the suggestion they can improve, that they were created flawed. Fury sparks hot in Keith, and Shiro blinks as it washes over him.

“Listen to me,” Keith says fiercely. “There is _nothing_ wrong with you.”

Shiro opens his mouth to disagree, wanting to argue that there is, that it’s okay if there is, that he doesn’t care – but one look at Keith’s burning expression silences him.

“You’re a good person,” Keith says, a note of finality to the statement.

“I am not good,” Shiro says quietly. “I am not even a person.” Keith’s frustrated noise tells him he ought not to quibble about semantics, but Shiro presses on, “Angels do not have a moral compass. To develop desires outside of our orders… it is a fundamental flaw.”

“Your orders are to kill me,” Keith snaps. “Does that sound righteous to you?”

Air Shiro doesn’t need shudders from his lungs. Some heavenly body is laughing at him, bestowing irony after irony: his soulmate is a cambion, hunted by Heaven, and Shiro is charged with his protection in more ways than one. If it were not the first order he had found fault with – but it _is_ , and there is little Shiro can do to reclaim Keith’s fate. All he can do is prolong it.

“No,” he says aloud. His gaze lights on Keith’s face, still tense with displeasure, and a feeling that is almost pity comes to him. “I’m sorry this has happened to you.”

Keith stands up, energy propelled by anger. “Don’t do that.” Shiro tilts his head to the side. “Don’t shut yourself off. I can tell when you’re going all angel, you know.”

Any objections Shiro might raise are concerned with semantics once more, and so he keeps his mouth shut. “You should sleep,” he says instead, pretending to himself that it is not cowardice, not putting off the argument.

“Yeah,” Keith says derisively. “Long day tomorrow.”

His mood is palpable as he readies for bed. Shiro sits in the straight-backed chair and listens to the chattering of angels upon Earth – Sendak’s voice conspicuously absent – and Keith’s footsteps are harder than usual, huffs of air escaping his nose as he throws clothes on the bed, the bathroom door slamming behind him. Shiro makes no comment, serenely staring into space, and this absence of focus is why he jumps at the sudden ring of Sendak's voice.

The Enochian is rough and familiar and Shiro’s human skin breaks out in goosebumps, a curious reaction he means to study, but Sendak is speaking of narrowing down the cambion’s location, determining if Shiro is aiding it, a deadline being set for Sendak’s solo mission before he is forced to enlist others’ help.

Of course, Shiro thinks bitterly, in his arrogance, Sendak would wish to face them alone.

Keith’s voice comes close to his ear. “Hey,” he says, straightening up as he sees he has Shiro’s attention. “You hear something?”

Their previous hostility apparently forgotten, Shiro nods. “Sendak comes alone,” he says.

“Is that a good thing?”

Shiro shrugs. “Alongside other angels, Sendak finds he must tame his brutality. Alone – “

“He can do what he wants.” Keith’s gaze is piercing when Shiro meets it, almost as though he, too, can look through Shiro and see what makes him who he is. Shiro feels the edges of Keith’s soul, a bright thing, growing brighter still as Keith’s trust in him grows and the dark, crawling barriers fall away, and it soothes him as nothing else can. His soulmate has a beautiful soul. It makes everything Shiro has struggled through to get here seem all the more worth it.

Belatedly, Shiro nods. Keith’s cheeks are flushed, as though he knew the subject of Shiro’s intense focus.

“We’ll take him,” Keith says. His hand raises, twitches, as though he were going to touch Shiro again, but then he turns. “Goodnight, Shiro.”

Shiro has grown accustomed to Keith in sleep. Keith doesn’t move or make much noise, but his face relaxes as it never does in waking, jaw free of tension and the furrow gone from between his eyebrows.

He had had no point of reference before, but knows now Keith’s human visage is beautiful, delicate and masculine all at once. Shiro’s eyes trace the sweep of Keith’s eyelashes, the slight flare of his nostrils as he draws precious air into his lungs, the sharp angle of his cheekbone shadowed in moonlight.

One of Keith’s hands is splayed on the pillow beside his head, long fingers skilled in hunting and hurting, but in comfort too. Shiro remembers well Keith’s hand on his shoulder, momentary as the touch had been. He suspects it is a memory he will cling to in time; regardless of what happens tomorrow.

Keith sleeps badly, at first. Shiro is roused in the small hours before dawn by Keith’s tossing and turning, and after a moment’s hesitation, Shiro approaches him, touches two fingers to Keith’s temple, and murmurs, “Sleep.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i decided to make this fic 4 chapters instead of 3!

**Author's Note:**

> please leave a comment if you enjoyed, and you can find me on twitter at twitter.com/starboysheith and tumblr at starboykeith.tumblr.com !


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